


Taking a Leap of Faith

by N3GatorFan



Category: Forever (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Temporary Character Death, Canon-Typical Violence, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Attempted Suicide, Post-Finale, Reveal, Temporary Character Death, Thank Nora for That Idea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-01
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-13 06:06:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29771778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/N3GatorFan/pseuds/N3GatorFan
Summary: Henry has been careful about whom he trusts with his past since that second fateful day 200 years ago. He trusts Jo with a part of it, but he can't tell her the rest of it. When he tries to prove his condition to save her from Adam’s clutches, Henry finds she’s not the only one needs to take a leap of faith when it comes to the truth about his immortality. Set one year after 1x22.
Relationships: Jo Martinez/Henry Morgan
Comments: 8
Kudos: 13





	Taking a Leap of Faith

**Author's Note:**

> Author’s Note: I’m sorry that this debuted in March. I had wanted to debut the start of a new novel-length story last month. When everything in my life went sideways (again), I decided to change gears. To take some pressure off of myself, I decided to work on several one-shots and short (e.g., 3 chapters at most) stories which I had started and abandoned in 2018. With the exceptions of a few minor edits for clarity and flow, the first half of this story was written in September of that year.
> 
> The story was inspired by a writing prompt from Promptuarium (https://promptuarium.wordpress.com/2015/04/25/if-you-dont-do-it/) It's a little darker than I usually write, but I hope that you will enjoy it.

“If you don’t do it, she will die.”

Staring at a terrified Jo as Adam pressed the knife against her throat, Henry gulped. He cared for her; he really did. Over the past two years, she had become his friend, his partner, someone who he cared very deeply about. Someone who he could imagine spending a part of his life with, starting with a romantic trip to the City of Lights. However, Adam forcing Abigail to choose between her life and that of her husband’s and son’s stabbed the younger immortal’s heart deeper than Adam’s knife would. And he wasn’t about to let Jo make the same decision.

A part of him cursed her for putting him in this situation. She should have just left well enough alone after she had returned his pocket watch to him the first time. She should have accepted the medical examiner whom his boss would have assigned to the scene of 32nd and Park. Yet, she had chosen to go over his head and had requested him as her medical examiner repeatedly. She had insisted that he should tell her the truth about his stalker, the _pugio_ , the mysterious disappearance of one of Bellevue’s patients, and everything else which he had kept hidden from her since the moment that they had met. She had followed him to another of his and Adam’s carefully arranged meetings, and she had demanded to know why the man she knew as Dr. Lewis Farber was there and what was going on.

Mostly, though, he cursed himself. He should have refused to accompany her to their first scene after their confrontation with Hans Koehler. He should have been content to remain in the morgue, providing mourning families with a few, howbeit unsatisfying, answers to their loved one’s demise. He should have walked past McSorley’s and started for home when he had spied her and Hanson through the ancient window. He should have refused Jo’s invitation to the karaoke bar where they had enjoyed Hanson’s renditions of several popular songs and where they had stolen a moment lost in each other’s eyes. He should have asked Lt. Reece to request another medical examiner to look into Blair Dryden’s death. He should have tackled Adam and wrangled the incriminating photograph of him, Abigail, and an infant Abe out of the other immortal’s hand, and he should have taken it to the same ethereal grave that he emerged from minutes after his death. He should have used Jo’s anger toward him for not being forthcoming with her as an excuse to cease his work with her and to return to his search for a cure to his condition.

Better yet, he should have listened to his better judgment, and he should have fled New York the moment that Adam had first called the OCME and had asked for him. If he had, he would have prevented Adam from ever taking an interest in the young detective. And he would have never allowed his heart to entangle itself with hers.

Henry’s heart pounded in his chest, almost loosening his grip on another incriminating picture. This time, it was a locket which showed him in his mortal life, dressed as though he had stepped out of one of Gilbert Stuart’s or John Trumbull’s paintings, and Nora. It was a present to her before he had boarded _The Empress of Africa_ centuries ago. Adam had stolen it from his and Jo’s latest crime scene. It and Adam’s threat of telling his superiors the truth about him had coerced Henry into packing his luggage and to meet Adam before their departure to Chennai, never to return to New York.

“Hand her the locket!”

Adam’s stern tone jolted Henry back to the present. Closing his eyes to steady his emotions, he drew in a deep breath. Jo was a rational woman. He could not expect her to believe him if he mentioned his true age, let alone the cause of it. All she would think was that he was spinning a fantastical story in order to appeal to her love of Jane Austen’s works or to extract himself from the current situation, whichever thought arose in her mind first.

His eyes traveled to the locket. Although she had been the more spiritual of the two, neither had Nora when she had persuaded him to loosen his tongue and to tell her about that fateful night. It had taken his inability to age for her to partially believe the truth about his first death. What if…?

Henry nodded at the knife. “Better yet, hand me your knife.”

“Henry?!” Jo’s voice trembled as her hands found Adam’s arm and futilely pulled at it. “What are you doing? Are you insane?”

“ _You’re mad.”_

Henry gathered his courage. “You won’t believe me if I told you. This is the only way.”

Adam scoffed. “Are you serious?”

Henry’s gaze traveled from Jo’s eyes and locked onto Adam’s. “Do you have a better idea? Either way, we’ll reside in white padded rooms in Bellevue if you don’t.”

His eyes widening, Adam slowly released Jo’s neck from the knife’s grip and his arm from her torso. Once in his hands, Henry placed the knife’s cold, sharp edge against his wrist.

“Henry? Listen to me. Don’t do this.” Jo reached for her cellphone. “We can get you some help if you need it. You don’t have to take your life.”

“ _Put it down if you love me.”_

“ _I do. Which is why I can’t go on with you believing that I’m insane.”_

“ _Nora, please tell them there’s been a mistake.”_

“ _I just want you to get better.”_

“ _But you said you believed me.”_

“ _Because I wanted to stop you from hurting yourself.”_

“ _You’re sick, Henry.”_

The locket grew heavy in his other fist. He wanted to comply with Jo’s request to avoid the heartache of having yet another woman whom he cared about send him to a psychiatric ward. His hand, however, refused to drop the knife.

“ _I trusted you.”_

“ _There aren’t many people I trust in this world. You’re in rare company.”_

“ _You’re my friend, my partner, someone I care very deeply about.”_

“ _But not enough to trust, huh?”_

His eyes darted from Jo to an amused Adam, and he swallowed again as Jo moved toward him. How was she going to believe him if he didn’t go through with this?

The dim streetlights over the cemetery where Adam had informed him about the _pugio_ illuminated the faint scar under Jo’s tank top. Their confrontation with Koehler had felt as though it had happened centuries ago….

“ _I thought you both fell off that roof…. There’s something that you’re not telling me.”_

“ _Henry… Are you all right?”_

His eyes widened. How could he have forgotten about that?! She had reasoned then that he should have been either dead himself or in a medically-induced coma, not standing by her hospital bedside as though nothing had happened. And she had chosen to stay beside him as things had heated up to the point of almost total war between him and Adam.

“ _Someday, you’ll let me in when you’re ready.”_

He drew in a deep breath. To be honest, he was never ready for this. But if it would save Jo from Adam’s clutches, now would be the time to do it.

“You have to hear me out.” He licked his lower lip and steeled himself. “What if I were to tell you that this will not hurt me? That, if I were to cut myself, I would remain as whole as I am now?”

“What are you saying?”

“What if I were to tell you that I’m immortal?”

Jo scoffed. “That’s ridiculous.” She took another step toward him, convincing him to back up to prevent himself from slipping and inadvertently plunging the knife into her. “Just put the knife down. I get that you’ve seen too much death as a ME to not be affected by the job. I also get that whatever your beef is with Dr. Farber doesn’t help matters. Let me help you. You don’t have to do this.”

The brick wall entered his vision. He stopped, locked eyes with her, and willed himself to drown in them to gain the courage that he needed.

“You’re right, I don’t. But I didn’t have to do this two hundred years ago either.”

She opened and closed her mouth several times. “Two hundred—? What—?”

“Think about it, Jo. You have said so yourself. There is no way that I can know everything that I do without living ten lifetimes.” She advanced toward him at an alarming rate, each step threatening to cause the knife to slip from his grip. “You watched me fall from Grand Central’s roof and later saw me at your hospital bedside as though I had remained by your side and called 9-1-1 instead.”

She slowed to a stop. Henry hoped that he was getting through to her.

“I didn’t lie to you when I told you I was shot. I was, with the same gun that you had heard when Adam—” he nodded toward the other immortal behind her, “—and I had met on the abandoned platform under the Fort Hamilton Station last year. The same one that had been in Isaac Monroe’s possession from the time he had raised _The Empress of Africa_ until he had displayed it in the Explorer’s Club.”

Her eyes searched his. “What are you talking about? You should have—.”

At that moment, her eyes glazed over. Her jaw fell toward the ground while her mind worked through his comments in the same manner that he had seen it operate during an investigation. His heart raced to keep up with the thought that she must have laid her hand on the same location as his scar shortly after his confession, and she had felt her heartbeat pulsing under her fingers.

Soon, a silence grew between them. A part of Henry urged him to leave the cemetery and to run as far as he could. His heart kept him rooted to the ground. His eyes stayed on Jo as though his life depended on it.

“So, it’s true? How is it even possible?”

He lowered the knife to the ground and set Nora’s locket next to it. “I wish I knew. I had spent two hundred years attempting to learn why I remain in the land of the living. That is why I study death. That is why Adam, under the alias of Dr. Lewis Farber, had sought me out in a misplaced hope that I had a cure for our shared curse. That is why he used the stolen flintlock pistol and his role in the death of Sylvia Blake—the woman I call Abigail—to convince me to steal the _pugio_ from the evidence room. To test his theory that we could die by the same weapons used in our first deaths.” His stomach churned at the memory. “The second shot that you heard in the tunnel had killed me just before your arrival. As it turned out, his theory was merely a fantasy that he had entertained for the thirty years between his discovery of me and our meeting.”

Jo’s eyes began to glow, just as they had moments before Adam’s second call. “You can’t die? I mean, you can, but it’s not permanent?”

Something brushed along his feet, but Henry didn’t care to look for its source. He had waited too long to tell her everything.

He nodded. “I had never intended for you to find out like this.” He sighed. “I had always wanted to tell you, but I had been afraid that, if you knew about me, you would reject me.” Unable to bear the pain of his deception, he directed his gaze to the tiny space between them. “I had assumed that you would either run and never return or that you would have me committed since the story sounds insane,” which he still expected. “Looking back now, I was wrong in doing so, and I beg for your forgiveness.”

He swallowed. She would be right to never forgive him. If the roles were reversed, it would take him a very long time for him to begin to forgive her.

When he dared to look up, his eyes met hers again. A slight smile graced her face, tempting him to move closer to her. “You trusted me all this time? All of the weird comments that you’ve made about New York in the past and about living long enough? Those were your way of telling me the truth?”

He shook his head in amazement and scoffed. “Apparently, I had. I usually run if someone were to discover my condition.” He ran his hand through his hair. “I have no idea why I haven’t been able to with you.”

She lowered her eyes and nibbled her lower lip before meeting his gaze again. “Why do you call your immortality a curse?”

Before he could suggest that she pick up Nora’s locket, a slicing pain pierced his back. Adam withdrew the blade, and Henry’s body crumpled under its own weight.

Behind him, he could hear Adam’s footsteps fall on the sidewalk. Henry tried to breath a sigh of relief, but he couldn’t draw enough air for it. As long as Adam left the cemetery, Jo would be safe…for now.

As his vision began to blur, she knelt beside him. “Henry.” Nora’s panic echoed in Jo’s voice. “Tell me what to do.”

His eyes darted as his life flowed from him. Was he hallucinating during his final moments?

Willing himself to remain strong for her if he wasn’t, he tried to find her. “The river. Meet me at the river.”

“The river? What—?”

His river of memories drowned out her next words. Before he knew it, he took his last breath and vanished.

* * *

The last few strokes felt like molasses as Henry propelled himself toward the surface. He summoned his courage and gave himself one final push. Within seconds, he breached the waves and gulped in the first breath of hot summer air.

He wiped his face, not caring if the East River’s brine got into his eyes. His mind was as foggy as it typically was after a long, dream-filled night. If he were home, he would prepare himself a cup of coffee—or two—and wait until he fully woke up before attempting to determine what had just happened.

The current tugged at his kicking legs as though it was an impatient child wanting to show him something further downstream. Henry pointed himself toward the shoreline, leaned forward, and headed for the lights outlining the park’s paths.

With each stroke, the fog dissolved, and the day’s events emerged into view. His heart raced to his throat and pounded against his voice box. The last thing that he clearly remembered was Adam stabbing him and his body falling to the ground. He thought that Jo had knelt down beside him and asked him what she should do….

He shook his head as he struggled to cross a wave. He was hallucinating. There was no way that Jo had believed him. Her questions and her gradual acceptance of the truth were merely a ploy to gain more information about his mental state. Just like Nora had centuries ago, Jo likely planned to turn him over to Bellevue the moment that she saw him again.

He swallowed, but the lump in his throat refused to budge. Then again, he couldn’t remember if Adam had left the cemetery. What if the psychopath had stabbed Jo as well, and she was taking her final breaths at this moment? He would never forgive himself if he found her body lying on his autopsy table when he would show up for work tomorrow morning.

Henry’s toes struck the jagged rocks lining the riverbed, jarring him out of his dark musings. Wincing, he stood up and trudged onshore.

He huffed as he headed for the nearby benches. It appeared that he had no choice now. He needed to flee New York and to never look back. Abe would certainly protest his life being uprooted again, but as long as he risked being committed or mourning the loss of yet another person in his life, they could not remain in the city where he had built a life for himself over the past seventy years.

His eyes flitted from place to place. He had originally planned to travel to Brussels or the South of France after Adam’s first call. Personally, they could stay in France for a while, and then….

“ _The single best thing to do in Paris is to get lost.…But know that this regimen works best only if done with someone you find very special.”_

His eyes watered. He wasn’t sure if he should have blinked the brine out of his eyes before he had left his awakening spot or if he was on the verge of tears.

He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. The Bordeaux countryside would bring back the memories of this day, and he would collapse under his grief. So, Belgium, it was.

Now, there was the matter of his suitcase and his satchel. He could risk contamination of a crime scene to retrieve them, Nora’s locket, and his pocket watch. As long as no one discovered him….

“Henry?”

He shook his head again. The familiar-sounding feminine voice must have been calling another man who shared his name.

“Henry?”

This time, the voice registered in his mind. He froze midstep. Was he hearing things?

He turned around and dared to look at the speaker. His heart drummed against his scar when Jo appeared before him.

_No. This isn_ _’t possible. She’s either en route to Bellevue or lying between the tombstones. She can’t be here._

He closed his eyes and shook his head. When he opened them, she remained before him.

_No, she_ _’s neither a hallucination nor a ghost. That means…_.

He gulped. He must be going to Bellevue within the next few minutes.

His knees buckled under him, and the park spun around him. That was, he was going there right after the emergency department checked him out for signs of syncope.

“Jo.” The whispered name escaped from his lips before he knew it. “I—.”

Jo closed the distance between them, wrapped one hand around his neck, and laid a slender finger from the other over his lips. As her brown eyes searched his, they begged him to trust her in spite of his misgivings.

A small smile played on her lips. “Let’s get you into some clothes before the unis catch you in your birthday suit.”

She released him, and, seemingly out of nowhere, she produced a suit of clothes. His eyes widened when he recognized that they were a pair of NYPD sweatpants and a T-shirt.

He furrowed his eyebrows. How did she obtain them so quickly? Even with light traffic on the streets and barring an interrogation from her colleagues, it would have taken her at least half an hour to travel to the precinct, acquire the garments, and come to the river.

“I hope you didn’t mind me taking your books out of your satchel. I raided your suitcase, and I needed something to put your clothes in without looking too conspicuous.”

_My satchel?_

His eyes traveled to her shoulder. Sure enough, his satchel’s handle draped over her shoulder and rested comfortably across her chest.

He stared at her. She must have grabbed it and his suitcase to prevent anyone from learning of his and Adam’s latest confrontation. Why would she do that?

To take his mind off his questions, Henry glanced over Jo’s shoulder. A pair of patrol officers strolled down the path paralleling the river.

Having no desire for another arrest, he stepped into the sweatpants. As he lifted his other leg to slip it into the garment, he swayed toward her.

He caught himself before he fell into her. He offered her a small smile which he hoped would keep her from worrying about him.

He tried again and eased the sweatpants over his waist just as the officers approached the intersection. His fingers fumbled with the drawstring. He haltingly tied the bow and huffed. It wasn’t perfect, but it was good enough for now.

He slipped on his shirt and eyed them. He breathed a sigh of relief as they continued their route without a glance in his direction. It appeared that he would avoid another arrest tonight.

Jo joined his side. The hand closest to him found his shoulder while the other one reached around him and wrapped itself around his bicep. She nudged him toward the bench, and, to his surprise, she took his elbow as soon as they left their spot.

Henry’s heart pounded against the knotted tissue under his scar as his body complied with her unspoken order. What was going on here? It was almost as if….

“Let’s get you down before you pass out on me.”

She turned him around so that they could sit. He studied her as he settled down on the wooden seat. If he didn’t know any better, he would swear that she really did believe him.

She tilted her head. “May I?”

Not trusting his voice or his words, he nodded.

Henry’s breath hitched as she lifted his shirt and leaned behind him. Regardless of what she believed, he needed to give her this.

Her fingers glided over the spot where Adam had plunged his knife into him. Knots that he didn’t even know he had released their grip on his muscles, and his emotional tension drained from his body.

Shivering under each pass of her hand, he bent over, grasped the edge of the bench, and squeezed his eyes shut. Whatever she wanted to do to him, it was working.

She slowed her movements and lingered over the place where the blade had entered his body. The summer night kissed his cheeks and his forehead. It had been a long time—too long, admittedly—since he had last felt like this. Her skin on his gently reminded him that he was here. That he was alive. That he still had his whole life before him and that he should embrace it, starting with this moment with her.

Her hand soon left his back. Another slight chill brushed over his bare skin. He took a deep breath. He wished that her fingers would graze the rugged scar that had intrigued her since she had first noticed it. He would give her anything that she wanted if she did.

A moment later, his shirt dropped into its place. He inwardly moaned as he slowly returned to his senses. For those few moments, he was human again. He would give anything—even his immortality—to feel that way for the remainder of his days.

He released the bench and met her eyes. She gaped at him, almost as though she was seeing him for the first time.

“This is why you wouldn’t let me in,” she muttered, more to herself than to him. “You felt that you couldn’t trust me with this.”

Jo shook herself out of whatever she was thinking and studied him. “How are you feeling now?”

Henry mentally examined himself for any lingering symptoms. “I’m feeling much better now. Apparently, my body had started to go into shock, and the rest alleviated the symptoms.”

“Good.” She rose to her feet, and he permitted her to help him up. “For a while, you had me worried. I thought I needed to take you to the hospital to get checked out.”

She spun him around and pointed in the direction of the parking lot. “I parked this way.”

They walked to her car in silence. She kept her gaze on him, breaking it long enough to let him in on the passenger’s side, open the vehicle’s trunk, place his satchel in it, and climb into the driver’s seat.

He swallowed, and his heart wrenched inside him. It was almost as if she believed that she would “wake up” and find herself at his funeral if she were to let him out of her sight.

“What now?” Henry found the used coffee cups and the gyro cart’s wrappers which hinted at their stakeout during their recently closed case. He would understand it if she wanted to share his “gift” with the world or if she turned him over to a rogue government agency or a laboratory interested in anti-aging research. The lure of gaining sudden fame and fortune, creating invincible soldiers, or defying time, nature, and fate had convinced Nora, the alienists in the Charing Cross asylum, Goebbels, and Harold Price to give into their base instincts and to find their own claim to immortality. Although Jo had exhibited no signs of ever betraying him in that manner, he couldn’t help but to think that she would now.

She took a deep breath, rested her arm over her seat, and checked for oncoming traffic. Once she was satisfied with the open parking lot, she backed out of her spot and headed for the nearby street.

Jo tightened her grip on the steering wheel and huffed. “First, I’m dropping you off at the shop. Then, I’m going home and downing a glass or two of the strong stuff.” She tilted her head, not taking her attention off the stop-and-go traffic. “Tomorrow morning, I’ll wake up thinking I’ve imagined the whole thing before reality crashes down on me again.” She took another deep breath. “I’ll call Lieu and let her know that I need some time off work. Mike might complain about me leaving him with the paperwork, but he can deal with it.” She waved her hand for emphasis. “After I hang up, I’ll try to find Abe’s recipe for his disgusting hangover cure online. Then, I’ll realize I’m too hung over to attempt to make it myself, so I’ll head over to the shop and ask him to make it for me. While I’m there, I have a million questions to ask you.” She glided to a stop behind the car waiting at the red light and reached into her pocket. “Starting with this locket and what had led up to everything that’s happened tonight.”

Henry raised his eyebrows as the locket’s chain glistened under the streetlights and tangled itself in her fingers. She had not only believed him but also accepted him for what he was?

He took the locket in his hand and opened it. Nora stared out at him as though she was daring him to deny everything and to tell Jo that she was imagining things once more.

As Jo’s plan rolled in his mind, Henry smiled. He didn’t know how, but, somehow, Nora’s power over him wasn’t as strong as it had been in situations like this.

He turned back to Jo. “Why don’t you skip a couple of steps and spend the night at the shop?” He hadn’t liked the idea of her driving while drunk or hung over ever since he had observed signs of her latest hangover and the cause of it when they had first met. “I’m sure that Abe wouldn’t mind, and you can begin to ask me anything you want as soon as you get up.”

She considered it for a moment and slowly nodded. “I think I will. It’ll beat the drive from my house to your place.” She offered him a smile. “Besides, you have better liquor than I do.”

He smiled. He had once opened the Hennessy to forget about the twin sorrows of not knowing Abigail’s fate and the sight of Jo spending time with—and even kissing—another man. He could reserve some of his personal bottle to help her alleviate any remaining nervousness in her body and mind.

Her refusal to stop after she had reached the number of glasses the bartender would pour for her flashed briefly before him. His stomach lurched. Then again, maybe not. She had become drunk when Aaron Brown’s murder had reminded her of Sean’s death. Although he had returned to her, she would reach for the bottle as soon as she remembered him taking his “last” breaths.

“If you want something nonalcoholic to calm your nerves and to help you sleep, we have tea infused with chamomile and valerian and the spices and extracts needed to prepare a glass of warm milk. It’ll be better for you.”

“I’m under doctor’s orders?” She chuckled. “Fair enough.”

She sobered and sighed. “It’s not every day that I find out that my friend and partner is immortal. He’s over two hundred years old. His ‘skinny dipping’ is a result of a death. That his knowledge comes from his long life.” She reached up and wiped the corners of her eyes. “That he—.” She drew a deep breath. “That he runs almost every time someone finds out the truth. That he tried to prove it to a wife long ago, but it apparently didn’t end well for him.” Her small smile and moist eyes suggested that she felt bad for him because of that. “We found his wife’s remains a year ago. And his stalker is not only still out there, but he’s also immortal and a bit of a psychopath.”

As the traffic departed from the intersection, she reached up to her neck and rubbed where Adam had held the knife. Henry used the opportunity to examine it. He swallowed as he noted the light pink streak across her jugular.

He closed his eyes and cursed himself. He was oh so close to losing her tonight. If only he had been honest with her earlier…. Perhaps he could have spared her from ever knowing the depths of Adam’s depravity except through historical records and his own testimony.

They rolled to another stop. He felt something wrap around his hand. He opened his eyes and searched for the object’s source. Jo squeezed his hand and smiled at him.

“We’ll get through this.” She squeezed his hand again. “It’ll take time to adjust, but we’ll get through this.”

“… _time to adjust_ ….”

Yeah, he could give her that. And anything else that she wanted. Even the world if he could obtain it for her.

She turned her attention back to the traffic. They rolled through another intersection only to glide to a stop at the next one.

A moment later, Jo opened and closed her mouth, blinked, and shook her head. She shifted around in the seat and peered at him.

“Abe’s your son?!”

Henry chuckled. “He is. Abigail and I adopted him toward the end of World War II. One of the Allied soldiers had found him in the concentration camps and laid him in Abigail’s arms. She sought out a doctor to examine him and found me. The moment that she had laid him in my arms, I knew that I wanted to take care of him for the rest of his life. We’ve been together for 71 years now.”

“I always knew something was off about the story you two gave me when we had dinner on your rooftop.” She scoffed and then smiled as she eased into the turn lane and rounded the corner. “I did _not_ count on that.”

She peeked at him. “When you let someone into your life, you really let them in, huh?”

He softly chuckled. It would appear so.

They continued on to the shop. Henry leaned his head against the headrest and closed his eyes, not noticing the locket falling into the trash on the floorboard. The first leap of faith in a relationship was always the most terrifying, especially when it came to his life. Tonight, he was glad that he had taken it, and, for a change, he was looking forward to seeing where it would take him.

**Author's Note:**

> Author’s Note: In case you’re trying to place the cemetery, it’s the same one from the episode “Hitler on the Half-Shell”.
> 
> While writing the story, I noticed that Jo asking Henry if she could look under his shirt bore some resemblance to pinkelephant5’s “Coming to Light” here on FF and here on AO3. If you’re interested, go ahead and checked out the story.


End file.
